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Sherry and Siege

So first, I'm sorry it's taken so long to respond. I know people have been seeing other posts made today and wondered why Siege wasn't getting a response to their own concerns.

I think I'll begin with an explanation of our intent in releasing Sherry the Mouse into the game, and then move onto what it means for Siege. Personally, I'm proud of Sherry - she's got the best NPC AI currently available in UO, is a vibrant, interesting character, and has a rich history from the Ultima lore. If there's any place we'd have wanted her to be most welcomed, it'd be with the dedicated veterans on Siege. She's Ultima, and we know you love Ultima.

You see, Sherry herself is the focus of this event, not the "rat invasion" which is the vehicle to introduce her. Of course, we understood that the Siege Castle British was in Felucca, and therefore a faction stronghold. This is a tough situation, because it makes absolutely no sense to introduce Sherry anywhere else; her home is Castle British. Even if the True Britannians have claimed it as their stronghold, and it, at the time, was being occupied by the Minax faction. It's still the place where Sherry wakes, sleeps, eats, and talks to visitors.

Yet Siege wasn't ignored here - we simply worked within the constraints of the system already in place. Those who hold the Castle in factions will have access to Sherry on Siege. I don't see that changing in the forseeable future, and I hope everyone here can understand *why* it's important that Sherry be there, rather than down in a corner in the sewers. We say we want Siege to have her, but it comes with a price.

On the other hand, the "invasion" is different, and here's what happens. A horde of rats (consisting of rats, sewer rats, and giant rats) overrun Castle British. The players can fight them as long as they'd like, but in the end it's Sherry who manages to scare them off, allowing the players to finish off the remainder. Clainin then proceeds to talk to Sherry for a moment, and then whisk her away for a bit. After that point, she becomes available to anyone on the Castle grounds as an interactive NPC. On some shards, this introduction event took all of five minutes, on other shards we forcibly extended it so EMs could have more control for their audience.

Thus, the real complaint, and please correct me if I'm wrong, hasn't been about Sherry yet, but that the people who aren't in factions missed out on the introduction event itself: the rats invading. Many seem angry about missing the chance to get the rare coins, for instance. Yet many more feel indignation against what they feel is a slight against them as Siege players, where none was truly intended. I can understand that though: Siege is special and bears special consideration.

In this case, what it meant was accepting that Sherry would have to be in a place dominated by factions. It does not, though, necessarily mean that this was the only chance you'd get to do something like the rat invasion, or the only time you'd ever see those old coins.

I can't tell you right this second what we'll do on Siege, but I did want to assure you that you're not being ignored, and this will be addressed.

I don't think that any players have a problem with Sherry the Mouse. On the contrary! The concept seems to be quite delightful, and I think that many players regret being denied the opportunity to meet her, more than missing out on a brief spawn.

It will be a shame if she is to be held hostage in the castle, locked away from her would-be fans. :-(

EDIT: Someone (was it Freja?) suggested in the UHall thread that Britain's faction stronghold be relocated to Lord Blackthorne's Castle. That would not only make sense for Siege, but free up Lord British's Castle for the use of the populations on all other Felucca facets, as well. Might this be a possibility?

Draconi - Thank you for taking the time to explain the thought process behind this event.

I think the anger you saw from many Siege players was the frustration we often feel, because it frequently seems like there isn't any special consideration when it comes to introducing new things on Siege. Perhaps having the rats invade the City of Britain, instead of just the castle would have been helpful. At least that way, so many wouldn't have felt left out. I suppose as long as there will be other opportunities for others to participate and collect a few coins, no real harm was done.

In any case, thanks for dropping in and taking the time to communicate with us. It is encouraging to see that happening!

Dor - I believe that Sherry does, on occasion, venture outside castle british from time to time. [I'm sure Kenji or someone else will correct me if I'm wrong on that, but I remember hearing that she does.]

Actually sherry never talked to clanin. She disappeared after the rats started spawning, cause since it was one of your briliant npc's you got out there now it would attack reds and chase them around. Clanin kept yelling for us to kill all the rats all the way until server down and then he disappeared. I did enjoy the event though, but im Minax and i can see why they wouldnt, but then thats also thier choice they made not to join factions.

Thank you for responding Draconi, if only more devs would take the time to respond to some of our concerns we wouldnt feel as neglected. Hopefully well see you more on here. As for Sherry , I heard from one of the guys who was holding the castle that she was there at first talking to the nobles and she began attacking the reds and they lured her into a corner right before the rats spawned and that was the last they saw of her.

There is no need to adress this since there is nothing wrong with it. I say make all events factions from now on. Better yet, should it not simply be mandatory to choose a faction to join? This is Siege. A lot of what it's about is risk, and challenge, which makes it more fun. People wanted actual benefits to factions instead of bs like monster ignore and blessings that don't belong on Siege? This sounds like a good one....so keep these events as a faction bonus, or imo instead require all to join a faction. It's time Siege stops catering to the trammies and becomes a land of risk where rewards are earned and challenges await around every corner.

Yet Siege wasn't ignored here - we simply worked within the constraints of the system already in place. Those who hold the Castle in factions will have access to Sherry on Siege. I don't see that changing in the forseeable future, and I hope everyone here can understand *why* it's important that Sherry be there, rather than down in a corner in the sewers. We say we want Siege to have her, but it comes with a price.

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I'm sorry to say that I don't see that. But then, I am blind.

First, and more simply, the event's aftermath. Getting to Sherry. For reasons covered below, hardly anyone can get to her. Is there ANY reason why there couldn't be a mousehole at the front of the castle, with her hanging around there? Is there any reason why she has to specifically be WITHIN the walls, rather than at a more accessible point of the castle?

That said, some comments/questions regarding the non-event.

What, if anything, does the faction barrier contribute to the event? My answer would be 'nothing'.

Considering that the faction zone is most likely an 'on' or 'off' setting in the configuration of the Fel map somewhere, there would have been no harm in turning it off for one night. Or even for one hour.

The controlling faction gains very little from that barrier - it's not as if they have extra storage, housing, or anything like that within the region. There's the sigils, true, but other factions always have the opportunity to get to them anyway, barrier or no barrier.

Instead, what we got was this:

picture taken by Beatrice Quill after joining Minax for a week

Nice trap work there, Minax. Very good tactics for defending your HQ. And no, that's not sarcasm.

So, the only way that people who do not normally take part in factions could get to take part in the event, would have been to temporarily join Minax. Not 'factions'. One specific faction. The same is true for those who have no interest in PvP, but want to see Sherry after the event.

However, you seem to feel that that despite a shard-wide broadcast was being repeatedly sent out, and despite the fact that most of the players could not get to the event - and STILL can not get to Sherry unless they join Minax, or spend a small fortune on faction trap removal, is not of consequence.

After all, you then go on to say "On some shards, this introduction event took all of five minutes, on other shards we forcibly extended it so EMs could have more control for their audience.".

What was stopping the EM from having some of the rats spawn just OUTSIDE the castle? Spill-over, so to speak? Nothing.

What was preventing Sherry (and Clanin) from having their meeting on the front steps of Castle British, in full view of all players, faction and non-faction? Nothing.

Siege has a traditional meeting place, used by 99% of EMs. That place is on Serpent's Hold - there's even a moongate right next to Castle British. It's there BECAUSE Castle British is a faction stronghold. This could easily have been used by an EM, and the EM could easily have gated those who showed up into the castle. But, from what I gather, Siege's event didn't even rate the attendance of an EM.

I appreciate that hindsight is always 20/20, and others will come up with dozens more ways that this situation could have been avoided, but the fact remains that less than a dozen people on Siege seem to have benefited from the work that went into this event.

The fact also remains that you have now created a situation on Siege whereby we either all join Minax, thereby making factions meaningless on Siege, or ignore all your colleagues hard work.

Still, thank you for your response, and I look forward to experiencing what you're going to do to address this on Siege.

thanks for any acknowledgement that siege exist! making post in our forum is great. i hate ea and most of the UO staff, but i still think this is better than nothing! so keep up your good work.

about the rats i really dont care cause i wouldnt expect you to code different for siege for these little quest. if people arent in factions on siege to acess all parts of the world and something speacil happens in that part of the world tough cookies, thats why its called siege perilous.

how about you address some key siege issues instead of this superficial quest stuff? there are key elements of siege that need some serious looking at that aren't really hard fixes but are just constantly ignored. but ok go back to ur quest stuff.

I don't think that any players have a problem with Sherry the Mouse. On the contrary! The concept seems to be quite delightful, and I think that many players regret being denied the opportunity to meet her, more than missing out on a brief spawn.

It will be a shame if she is to be held hostage in the castle, locked away from her would-be fans. :-(

EDIT: Someone (was it Freja?) suggested in the UHall thread that Britain's faction stronghold be relocated to Lord Blackthorne's Castle. That would not only make sense for Siege, but free up Lord British's Castle for the use of the populations on all other Felucca facets, as well. Might this be a possibility?

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It was not my idea to relocate it, someone posted that before me. I personly wish factions to Hell and removed from Siege,

Before we got Factions, Siege hade it's own factions and all was working well and with the guild and alliance system we have now, it would work even better.

Factions killed our old Felucca towns and the community around them. It messed up alliances when PK's and anti PK's joined same faction.

If we can't get rid of factions on Siege I will think it would be possible to find a better place. Maybe in East Brit, there is some unused houses, it would be easy to take a corner south of east brit, there is 5 houses noone ever do use. Make that corner for True Brit.

I don't like the idea about Lord Blackthorne's Castle, it should be open for all on Siege.

I really don't see why we need Factions on Siege, just get rid of it and the problem is solved.

I miss the good old days where PK's was red. Factions is only a kind of noto PK system in my eyes.

Stratics VeteranStratics Legend

Thank you for taking the time to address siege community on this event.

My own opinion would be that it wasn't a matter of joining factions but a matter of having to join a specific factions in order to participate.

As someone stated.. this is siege and being siege there comes risks. We are a veteran shard. So having to join a faction would not have a problem for most. However... in keeping with my own guild and guild roleplay.. I would not have been able to join minax faction.

I don't know what solutions or suggestions could be offered at this time. I just hope there is some consideration taken into specifically about siege and future events.

Yea she was spawned earlier today, but last night she was in the castle, up until all the rats spawned, i know this cause we locked her in a room on the south side. Once the rats were killed, she never reappeared, nor did clanin move on with his rambling about killing the vermin. And after server up he disappeared and she was still nowhere to be seen.

I think Draconi might have seen your post and put her back in the castle. lol You said you guys had Sherry locked in a room last night, but oddly enough, she was walking through walls when I saw her earlier. haha

I don't think its about the Sherry, or even the coins. It was the fact an event was held in UO, that on Siege, only people in one faction could partipate in. Other faction people could attend as well, if they took over the stonghold?(not real sure how factions work) But all that is beside the point....

basically there was an event held on Siege that a very small population got to participate in, and that should not be, and it seems that they will still only get to participate.

Is the Fel version of Lord British's castle a faction stronghold on all shards? If not then why is it like that on Siege.

I myself could care less for the coins, I had been following this story line, and kinda wanted to see Sherry, and see what info she had on the Inu plot. Guess I have to do that via the msg boards now.

Thus, the real complaint, and please correct me if I'm wrong, hasn't been about Sherry yet, but that the people who aren't in factions missed out on the introduction event itself: the rats invading. Many seem angry about missing the chance to get the rare coins, for instance. Yet many more feel indignation against what they feel is a slight against them as Siege players, where none was truly intended. I can understand that though: Siege is special and bears special consideration.

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Thanks for the response, Draconi. Let me try to explain my complaint about Friday night. Many of us looked forward to a shardwide event. We started watching for it early in the evening. Even though we started hearing that it was taking place in the castle, we trusted that we would still have the event because you posted that Siege would get it. It would have been much more considerate of you to have posted that only the Faction players on Siege would get to play. That would have allowed the rest of us to go do something else instead of wasting the entire evening.

I am not that upset that I did not fight the rats, or that I cannot talk to Sherry. (Feyre will be the one to figure out the clues no matter where Sherry is anyway) And the coins don't matter to me either. But I would sure appreciate you being more upfront about things like this to avoid keeping us hanging around for no good reason.

draconi, when will monsterignore finally be disabled. its ******** the way it works now. either make it change so it works against faction pets or disable it completely, but the current form is truely inacceptable

Draconi, Thank you for taking the time to respond. Maybe you don't have all the answers but it helps to have a response. That is my biggest gripe when something happens, EA ignoring us.

Hopefully your team can come up with something so everyone has a fair chance of attending. As I stated before, we all expect fighting to break out, that is our world we just dont want anyone barred from even attempting to attend.

I personally do not care much about event "items" although certainly that can be a fun aspect. What was disappointing was not getting the opportunity to even observe all your clever coding...which basically on Siege was done for the enjoyment of literally a handful of players. I know that wasn't the intent, but that was the result.

I have a faction character, not for monster ignore, nor do I care for PvP. I am in a faction so I can continue to be guilded with my best friend in UO, who very much enjoys PvP. I probably will make a suicide trip into the castle on my opposing faction character, just to take a look at the mouse since it is there, but interacting with an NPC is not why I play a MMORPG. I wanted to see the mouse or anything else the developers had in mind, with everyone else, as a community, when she made her debut. That is why I stubbornly hung around the castle entrance all evening on my non-faction primary character.

One other thing that annoys me, the continual "everyone could have just joined factions for a night" that some Siegers keep tossing out. Oh really? Everyone could have just resigned from their guilds, if their GM was not on hand to make a decision about the faction option for the entire guild...what a mess that would have created for our REGULAR playtime for just an evening's event. Guilds are an integral part of our game community, as everyone well knows, so that argument is simply ludicrous. Just because something is POSSIBLE, does not make it PRACTICAL.

EA created events should be geared to full opportunity in participation of the player base unless specifically announced to be otherwise in advance. I feel like I wasted 2 hours of my time Friday night, and I am not the only one. Because of the announcement, it never occurred to me that an EM would not do something to extend the event atmosphere to everyone waiting around, even if the bulk of it were confined to the faction stronghold. That never happened, and that is what I have a problem with.

Stratics VeteranStratics Legend

Is the Fel version of Lord British's castle a faction stronghold on all shards? If not then why is it like that on Siege.

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Yes Lord British's on every fel side shard is TB faction stronghold, and I always felt that was wrong to do that with the creation of factions TB, from the get go. There are a lot of huge buildings in Brit even underground areas that could have been utilised for the creation of a TB stronghold besides the most used building that everyone had for the most part, public access to. Our *lords* castles and palaces should be accessible to some degree to the general public of the citizenry, and probably LB's never should have become factioned blocking the ordinary citizenry from access to the King's throneroom, for forever.

While it may make sense that a king would have his factioners IN his place, it also makes sense that a king would wish some portions of his huge estate to remain accessible to his people to enable them access always, to enable the commoners to see him or for his citizentry to be able to be attending/attentive to him, inside some portion of the grounds for his own ceremonys, speeches, glorification and edification.

I mean Lord Brit's entire estate is huge, a portion of it in the yard out buildings solidly even on one entire side or both sides and back yards, could have been factioned off, yet his castle/throneroom could have been left open for the public. But when they created factions, they just blocked it all off instead creating issues, in the fel side of the importance of the use of Lord Brit's castle/throneroom for his people, citizens not in any factions ie every one else, for all these years.

Shadowlords back then were given a stronghold out there in no city, Minax too out there in the no mans lands, CoM got a big empty airy building, that barely had a wall to keep out any opposition in Magincia back then. I joined CoM when factions were brand new, due TO the challenge to try to defend a CoM stronghold that they created in the *airy no walls hardly Parli. building* I would still be loyal to CoM due to all the fights we had to fight in *airy building* till they *fixed it with more walling* if I ever got in factions again cuz we were given the WORST airy, hard to defend stronghold of the 4 attackable by land AND by sea. Then they slapped TB to hog up access of the entire LB castle, denying all the rest of the population of citizenry their access to LB's castle, when tons of caves in the ore mtns north of brit could have made quite a spiffy huge hidden cave sort of TB stronghold instead of LB's or for that matter the underground portions of the brit sewers could have even been changed over for an awesome TB stronghold underground in Brit too.

And a *mirror* of it all on Trammel is not the same historically, the fel side was the *original* home of our world's *king* and was public open for us all.

A lot of customers were not happy back then when they made factions, that TB stronghold was slapped in Lord British's entire huge estate. Personally I still do not like it. For every thing all these years that could or should take place in Lord Brit's is shut off to everyone *unless they are in factions* where before the access to the King's Throne room was accessible for EVERY citizen.

* The mirror image trammel just does not cut it...works for them hosting events to all shards that have a trammel, but even there, the fel sides will say same ..Lord British's home is the original one ..not the mirror copy cat that only came to be with Trammel when our king FLED like a coward to create the mirrored lands. Most oldsters would think of the tram side of LB castle just stands for ...cowardice and holds not the historic nor courageous value, as the original castle grounds.(which remains blocked off fel side to all, unless they are factions per shard).

People can taut join factions join factions then you might get in there if your faction is *pwning* Lord Brit's atm...pft I once was in Order..others were once in Chaos...somehow non Order non Chaos citzens 'still' could ENTER both palaces/castles when the gates opened, even when we had Order and Chaos housed in both the Lords' estates.

So yeh Sherry the Mouse *belongs* in Lord British's but SO DO WE the citizens belong accesssible to his throne room, without a faction tag on our heads, like we used to be able to enter his throne room one and all, if nothing else that room and access to his throne, should never have become blocked off to the masses of his own citizenry with factions to begin with. *sigh*

Personally I think Factions needs to be scrapped and replaced with a system to where guilds can conquer towns rather then factions. That would be a much better system then factions and actually give prestige to PvP guilds and would give them something more to do other then simply doing just Champ Spawns.

If factions must remain in place, I would agree, maybe consider moving True Britannians faction to Lord Blackthorn's castle. It used to be that players could fight for control of Lord Blackthorn's castle if I remember long ago but that no longer happens anymore.

Anyhow, some type of consideration or accomodation should be made for the players of Siege Perilous in my opinion.

EDIT: Someone (was it Freja?) suggested in the UHall thread that Britain's faction stronghold be relocated to Lord Blackthorne's Castle. That would not only make sense for Siege, but free up Lord British's Castle for the use of the populations on all other Felucca facets, as well. Might this be a possibility?

Thank you Draconi, for taking time on your weekend to address Siege player questions about the event.

Much like you said, my own dissapointment of the event was that only a few people got to see the introduction of it. For some, yes the solution can be that you could join Minax or another faction, but you can't force people to make choices like that. To make them jump over hurdles to participate in a simple event, for them it's not worth it.

I was lucky myself because I had another character that was in factions (and in Minax) and was able to kill rats and collect coins. However, I just felt bad because of all the people who were left out there waiting, were unable to participate.

Sherry the mouse does indeed belong in Castle British, no doubt about it, you want to stay true to the Ultima lore and I applaud you for sticking with it.

I just want to make sure, that future events on Siege will allow people of all types to participate in. You acknowledged it, and I hope the rest of the dev team does as well. With that, I look forward to what comes ahead.

As others have already said, thank you for taking time out on your weekend to address our concerns. I share the same feelings as some others. Like Skylark I sat around the castle for awhile convinced an EM would show up and extend the event to us after realizing Siege had been overlooked. As the time passed my annoyance turned to anger when I realized not only was Siege overlooked, but an EM wasn't going to do anything to mitigate it.

I would have liked to participate in the event, and as has been indicated by others as well I don't think quitting my guild and joining Minax for one night was the answer. For the next 7 days I wouldn't have been unable to fully play with my friends while I waited for factions to expire.

You have indicated no plans to make Sherry available to those not in factions in the future - should we be taking this as your suggestion that we:

a) Get in factions if we want to see Sherry (and possibly future events)
or
b) You say you care about Siege, but only so far as it doesn't inconvenience you?

Please note I've been very direct in my wording, this is not an attack - you took the effort to come here and address us, and I thank you for that. I'm simply looking to understand if your expecting me to join factions to continue to be involved in the game?

I'm annoyed I didnt get to enjoy the event, and I'm annoyed that I wont be able to talk to sherry, and hear all she has to say. I'm sure she will be directly involved in future events directly related the pm going story, and I'm annoyed that I (and the majority of the shard) will have to experience her role in said events second hand.

I understand that its just tough luck for me but its still annoying as hell.

Let me reitterate my post which was deleted probably because it wasnt very nice
Please stop making excuses and start making this game work for us

Why, thank you so much for coming to this forum, and I’m sure, monitoring these posts
Doesn’t it seem a little convenient that your answer to this problem is to not do anything?
Isn’t that what it is normally?
Why the big song and dance now?
Are we supposed to like it, is this a “feature”?
It just seems lazy and silly to me.

We know your hesitance to do anything different for Siege
But it doesn’t seem like you have thought this one through
Why would making it faction only enhance our experience of it
Just makes sense faction traps and runes beetles would be your outcome
And unlike everyone on this forum I will say I’m disappointed in not being able to take part
If the point of these event is to bring the shard community together to do something, why split it apart?

I dont think enough people play siege to custom tailor events that happen across all shards.

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I still think they could have just moved the TB stronghold to Lord Blackthorns castle. I personally didn;t care about not being able to kill some events but would have been nice if I didn;t have to go to a different shard in order to talk to one of my favorite chars from the single player series.

But doesnt it seem strange that they're telling us that the siege ruleset works for this event and that it is to be faction only
doesnt that seem a little, lazy?
Like many political problems, they have redifined the situation to fit their needs instead of actually fixing the problem

Yea 'cause after all it's in keeping with the story line to have the True Brits, followers of Lord British rally their troops and take rest in the castle of Lord Blackthorn...

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That is a good point just think it sucks that only a few even had the option of seeing Sherry or participating in the event. And I think it is great that Draconi came here and explained things, just wish it could have been different is all

Obviously they feel that it would have been a complete waste of time and money to customize this event for Siege and I can't say that I disagree. What is completely inexcusable is that they didn't take five minutes to post something explaining this BEFORE the event (using their usual flowery, corporate double talk) so that the handful blues who actually care about the in game events wouldn't have stood there holding their breathe for two hours.

Handle it with a little class next time (and it will happen again) post something for the people who don't seem to understand just how much time and effort would have to go into reprogramming something they see as such a simple thing, like moving a faction base or dropping a faction only barrier temporarily. It's not a simple thing folks, I'd be surprised if they even know exactly where to begin looking for that piece of code when you consider the number of people who've been through their revolving doors.

still all things considered.... the event should have taken place in blackthorns castle on siege to open it up for all of us but no biggie... its over and done with now and in the future ea and the devs will continue to make the same mistakes with siege, we have come to expect that...

I really dont think they care. If they did they woulda fixxed simple little things, like dropping ur armed blessed weapons, factions, loot bug and so on... Instead they post something silly hoping to shut us up for awhile.
Anyway my point being if they didnt fix the important stuff why would they waste a sec of thier time fixxing an event:/

Yet Siege wasn't ignored here - we simply worked within the constraints of the system already in place. Those who hold the Castle in factions will have access to Sherry on Siege. I don't see that changing in the forseeable future, and I hope everyone here can understand *why* it's important that Sherry be there, rather than down in a corner in the sewers. We say we want Siege to have her, but it comes with a price.

[/ QUOTE ]

If this was true, there should have been an announcement on the Siege boards in order to at the very least prepare for getting into the castle.

If you had announced this before hand, it would have been a problem, but at least guildmasters/the appropraite characters could have gotten into factions and been prepared en masse for this event.

Stratics VeteranStratics Legend

EDIT: Someone (was it Freja?) suggested in the UHall thread that Britain's faction stronghold be relocated to Lord Blackthorne's Castle. That would not only make sense for Siege, but free up Lord British's Castle for the use of the populations on all other Felucca facets, as well. Might this be a possibility?

They did it one time as they took the Minax base out of the Lost lands and could do it again - but better use a piece of land, which is not widely used.
Could be the farmlands, on which on Origin is currently shown the 9th Anniversary decoration.

But should not be a public building again like the castles of the two lords - somewhen in the future the same issue could be repeated, that someone thinks it would be cool to have certain stuff running in Lord Blackthorns castle.

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